Industry Engagement Forum in Lagos Aims to Increase Health Product Manufacturing in Africa

The 2024 Industry Engagement Forum, themed "Unlocking Healthcare Value Chains and Driving Investment through Partnerships: Accelerating Equitable Access to Quality-Assured Sustainable Health Products," is set to take place from May 7-9, 2024, in Lagos, Nigeria. The forum aims to accelerate equitable access to urgently needed health products through collaborative partnerships and to facilitate investment opportunities to expand local pharmaceutical manufacturing.

Dr. Abdu Mukhtar, PVAC National Coordinator, emphasized the importance of industrializing the health care sector, stating, “It is imperative and a necessity for future stability and growth.”

Dahlia Khalifa, IFC Regional Director for Central Africa, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone, highlighted Africa's vulnerability due to high dependency on imported pharmaceuticals and vaccines, expressing the need to strengthen local manufacturing value chains to create resilient health ecosystems.

Solomon Quaynor, Vice President for the Private Sector, Infrastructure and Industrialization at AfDB, shared insights on the African Development Bank's Pharmaceutical Action Plan aimed at bolstering Africa's pharmaceutical ecosystem through strategic interventions and partnerships.

Robert Matiru, Unitaid's Director of Programs, underscored the current opportunity to invest in regional manufacturing of quality-assured, affordable health products in Africa, emphasizing the potential to achieve more robust and self-sufficient health care systems across the continent.

The forum will gather international and African health care industry representatives to discuss creating sustainable regional value chains for health products, financing opportunities, and the role of digital technology in enhancing health product distribution networks. It aims to reduce Africa's dependency on imported health products and strengthen health systems to achieve universal health coverage and Sustainable Development Goal 3.

The event will also feature panel discussions, investment clinics, and networking opportunities to foster collaborations and support the growth of the pharmaceutical sector in Africa.